The Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism, through the Secretary of State for Tourism, has announced the call for the ninth edition of the EDEN Awards, European Destinations of Excellence ( European Destinations of Excellence), focused on this occasion on health and well-being tourism.

The EDEN awards, co-financed by the European Commission, are held every two years in the different States of the Union. They aim to draw attention to the value and diversity of emerging European destinations and to publicize those where sustainable tourism initiatives are being developed.

The main characteristic of the winners is their commitment to economic, social, cultural and environmental sustainability. The winners are always little-known emerging destinations.

Each participating country chooses in each call a winning destination and up to four finalists, who become part of the European Destination Network EDEN. This network allows the exchange of good practices and international promotion and marketing actions. More information about EDEN .

Currently, 350 destinations in 27 countries are part of this network. Spain has participated in seven of the eight editions, and has seven winning destinations and eighteen finalists. The winners are the Sierra y Cañones de Guara Natural Park (Huesca, Aragón); the Trasmiera Ecopark (Arnuero, Cantabria); La Guardia (Pontevedra, Galicia); the Ebro Delta Natural Park (Tarragona, Catalonia); the Sierra de las Nieves (Málaga, Andalusia); the Goierri Region (Basque Country) and the Ignatian Land: the beginning of the Ignatian path (Basque Country).

Promote health and wellness tourism

Each call places special emphasis on one area. This year, the Commission and the Member States wanted to contribute to raising the visibility of those emerging European tourist destinations that have developed innovative initiatives in their tourism offer based on health and well-being services.

The selection process consists of two phases. In the first, the Autonomous Communities choose, from among all the applications received in their territorial area, a destination that will be the one they present to the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism. In the second phase, the Secretary of State for Tourism chooses a winner and up to four finalists.

The winning destination and the finalists will receive the EDEN award in a ceremony to be held in January 2020 in Madrid, within the framework of the FITUR International Tourism Fair. Subsequently, only the winning destination will participate in the Awards Gala organized by the European Commission in Brussels in the first quarter of 2020.

Consult the rules of the call.

For any questions or clarifications, candidates can contact sgcooperacionturistica@minetad.es